


Zech. 4:6*

by Enedda



Series: A Study in Marcus [3]
Category: The Exorcist (TV)
Genre: Other, Self-Harm, domestic abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-16
Updated: 2018-03-16
Packaged: 2019-04-01 06:08:56
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 412
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13992108
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Enedda/pseuds/Enedda
Summary: One stormy night brings Marcus to the mirror. And the night was dark and full of terrors.





	Zech. 4:6*

**Author's Note:**

> Hey, loves. Just a little warning - this text can trigger/upset some people. Marcus is an adult with a very complicated and not-so-happy past, so be careful. Lot's of mentions of self-harm and mental results of domestic abuse.

Marcus didn’t like mirrors. Never having considered himself being nice-looking enough, even in his youth. Now things were much, much worse.  
There was a storm today, a really big one and everyone in St Aquinas gathered in the reading room, talking in hushed voices pretending they were not afraid of the roaring element. He was alone, thinking.

Remembering.

He remembered his father’s hands, beating him and his mother so hard the only hope was not to awake the next day. The same hands he was seeing now. Slim, veiny and strong. He tried changing them with tattoos, drawing, scars… nothing worked. He had his father’s hands.  
He had his father’s face. Some lines were different, but with age he could see him in himself more and more and he wasn’t okay with that. His eyes were similar too, bearing secrets too dark to explain.

He looked down.

He had his father’s body. Lanky and long-limbed. Blonde chest hair. Only the scars were really his. The deepest ones on his wrist, covered by the black shoelace with the medalion of St Dymphna he got in Gheel, Belgium years back. All the rest, the self- and demonic harm, the map of his life on the outside.  
He tried to change the inside, too. His father was a tall man, like him, but burly, strong, built almost like a gladiator. Marcus started starving himself when he was a teenager and one terrifying night had noticed the similarity for the very first time. Now even if he wanted, he couln’t gain more weight. So this was his small victory.

He had his fathers’s soul. Dark, brooding, violent. He always found it easy to fight, easy to argue. Agression was much too easy.  
That’s why first he turned it inwards.  
Then he found God and tried, tried so hard to fill all of the emptiness with His light. He was afraid there wasn’t enough, he wasn’t enough for Him.  
Marcus touched the surface of the mirror.  
He’d put the full armour of God but his struggle was against his own flesh and blood. Could he win, or maybe just feel a bit more… fit, one day?  
He felt moisture on his face. His fingers were wet, too. Looking into his eyes, he understood.

_Not by might nor by power, but by my Spirit,’ says the Lord Almighty*_.

The fight is not over. It will never end, but it is oh, so worth it.

***

He will paint tonight.


End file.
